Sale Of The Century

If you happen to be wandering through Surry Hills tomorrow (all the smart people do) check out the Fabulous Editor's Garage Sale near the Bourke Street Bakery (633 Bourke Street). It's not be missed and begins at 8am and expect lots of fabulous designer outfits on sale both local and international brands plus lots of desirable goodies.

The sale is a combined effort of fashion journalist identities Lee Tulloch (above) -she lived in New York for years so expect lots of DKNY and Jo Gambale.  Get in early and grab a designer bargain!

 Meanwhile the auction house Lawsons (the Shuttle has furnished our house with amazing finds there) has an on-line auction of a collection of international designer outfits from Cartier, Dolce & Gabana, Diane von Furstenberg, Gucci and-well you name it's there. Some items are pictured below Go to the Lawsons' website for the auction : One Woman's Wardrobe - Vintage Fashion &Accessories 

Copy This ! : Designer's Anger at Newspaper

Strong words have been appeared on Facebook with professional Australian designers expressing their disgust at an advertisement that appeared in the Fairfax newspaper The Sun Herald on the weekend.
Heidi Dokulil, former editor of Monument Magazine and co-founder of the respected Australian Design Unit posted:
 "SMH you should be ashamed of yourself! Yesterday's advertorial for copycat furniture placed opposite the work of an absolute design legend is disgusting. The headline 'make a classic choice' rubs salt in the wound and shows just how low some major newspapers are going to make advertising $$. Design rip-offs hurt the industry and the thousands of hardworking local designers. What next SMH, a feature on Coco Chanel flanked by fakes? I'd like to see how that goes down".  Ouch !.
 Other designers have condemned the positioning of the advert for 'replica' Eames furniture and were busy arranging an email campaign to the Sun Herald. Some have forwarded a complaint to Media Watch. 
An Eames original can sell for around $5400 while the Taiwanese copy, sold out of a showroom in inner Sydney goes for just $1800. In 2011 the US Henry Miller company which distributes furniture designed by the legendary Americans Charles and Ray Eames reached a settlement with the distributor but they are still trading on the valuable Eames name.

left : a genuine Eames chair and right : the "replica"

The Double Bay newspaper Latte Life found recently when it discovered a local shop flogging handbags that looked identical to well known brands like Gucci and Louis Vuitton, that the law is difficult to get enforced and authorities can be apathetic much to the annoyance of other shopkeepers in the Bay selling genuine goods. 
China is famous for producing 'replicas' (today's speak for rip-off) of just about anything including a Rolls Royce Phantom, Mini Cooper and the humble Toyota Corolla. While the Rolls copy, labelled a Geely GE sells for just $30,000  a genuine Rolls Phantom can cost up to $1M.
 Australia is not new to rip off designs. In the days before the Internet one fashion store chain owner turned property developer was known for having models and friends regularly bring back a suitcase of the latest London and Paris designs which were whipped up into copies in local factories and on sale within days of their appearance on the international catwalks  
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As the election campaign revs into high gear, a 'replica' front page newspaper war has also broken out on Facebook after the Daily Telegraph published it's front page attack upon prime Minster Kevin Rudd.
Those firmly in the Labor camp were furious and a replica was soon on-line replacing KRudd with Tony Abbott. By the end of the day Rupert Murdoch's face had replaced Abbott's. By midnight News Ltd journalists were in the firing line.
And this is just Day One !

Sir Laurence Street Joins the Team in Elizabeth Bay

Sir Laurence & Lady Penny Street

He is one of the Shuttle's favourite legal eagles and one of Australia's most respected jurists. At 87 years of age, Sir Laurence Street has moved into the uber smart nursing home Lulworth House in Elizabeth Bay.

Sir Laurence joins a veritable smorgasbord  of Sydney's most well known faces including entertainer Jeanie Little. promoter Harry M.Miller , Dame Leonie Kramer , former NSW premier Neville Wran and former Prime Minister Gough Whitlam.

Harry Miller * Jeannie Little * Gough Whitlam

Sir Laurence Street & Rachel Finch
       at a party in 2008

Sir Laurence Street was the Chief Justice of the NSW Supreme Court and comes from a distinguished family of lawyers. His father Sir Kenneth Street was also NSW Chief Justice and his mother Jessie Street a tireless worker for Aboriginal and women's rights. It was largely her efforts that led to indigenous Australians finally getting a vote in 1967 (at one stage she was called Red Jessie in the media and a Conservative government refused to re-new her passport whilst she was abroad).

Nevile Wran (right) with
 artist Martin Sharp

Like Miller, Little , Whitlam and Wran, Sir Laurence was a regular on the social circuits in Sydney and Melbourne before ill health saw him hang up the gold embossed velvet Gucci pumps he often wore to parties.
Wife Penny Street is a great pal of Prince Charles and the pair always dined with Charles on his Australian visits.
Meanwhile a claim late last year by a former nurse that Lulworth House residents were "under-nourished" seems to have vanished from the ether.

Abbey Under The Knife

She was the face of Versace's 2011 Spring campaign and this year the face of Gucci but gorgeous Australian model Abbey Lee Kershaw was absent from much of the catwalk at the recent New York Mercedes Fashion Week.

Now Patti Huntington of the [frockwriter] blogspot has revealed that Abbey is to undergo an operation in the Big Apple today because of a knee complaint that has troubled her for several years. Kershaw has taken a tumble at a few fashion shows which would not have helped her ligaments and fainted once at an Alexander McQueen parade.

Huntington also speculates the world's no 5 top model may be working on a project with Stephen Spielberg. Read more at [frockwriter] and see more of Mario Testino''s wonderful pics of Abbey here.

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     Duty Calls...

 An odd thing has been happening in the local media scene over the past few months.
Amongst the loose  gaggle of  paparazzi who attended every media event in Sydney and Melbourne, several of the more eager (read aggresive ) members have been no-where to be seen.

The lads from Big Picture seem to have vanished into the mist, coincidentally just as the Leveson Inquiry in the UK went into second gear.

Run by the self styled Mr Paparazzi Darryn Lyons of implanted six-pack fame, the Big Picture crew were all over the place in the last few years, exasperating the oldtimers of the pap scene who relied on keeping a low profile. In the UK they were equally disliked by the regular celebrity snappers who hang around outside the homes of the famous.
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Lyons is currently starring in Excess Baggage, the bizarre TV show where viewers watch a bunch of  minor celebrities like Ajay Rochester and Kevin Federline (Britney Spears's ex) try to lose weight. It's a bit like watching paint dry.

Could the low profile of the Pig Picture snappers and Mr Lyon's extended stay in Australia have anything to do perchance, with the fact that Justice Leveson wishes to call a representative of the paparazzi to the witness box and interrogate them over their relationship with the late News of The World and accident prone The Sun ?.

Lyons has claimed he got his start in photography after a 'chance meeting' with Rupert Murdoch (although the great man when once asked said he'd never heard of Lyons). Whatever happens the name Murdoch is probably not the best one to drop should Mr Paparazzi end up in front of M'Lud.